


Toe The Line

by mariadperiad20



Series: Foray into B99 [22]
Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Amy is the universe, F/M, Jake Peralta Loves Amy Santiago, Suicidal Thoughts, Surrealism, introspective, no one dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:01:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23815798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mariadperiad20/pseuds/mariadperiad20
Summary: He moves through life unchanged, unaltered. He is the constant, the monotony, the non-living of living that is sleep.Maybe that’s why he was always tired.
Relationships: Jake Peralta/Amy Santiago
Series: Foray into B99 [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1320137
Comments: 22
Kudos: 153





	Toe The Line

There was a line.

Amy stayed a good distance away from it - giving it a safe birth, and then an extra distance to that. She was smart, clever. Calculating.

Jake was decidedly not.

He didn’t just toe the line, he did a fucking jig on it while belting out lyrics to Cyndi Laupner. He didn’t _do_ careful.

Maybe that’s why he was here. He hadn’t intended anything to go wrong - but then, he never really intended anything, did he? He just reacts. It’s how he was built.

Amy was created with loving devotion, crafted by a diligent God who took every minute detail into account. She was sculpted from gold or jewels or maybe starlight itself, except none of those could come close to explaining how she was so divinely made. She was the encapsulation of everything there is that is good, everything that is potential and that is growing, living, breathing, moving, _alive_ because when Jake looks at her he feels so, so alive.

Jake was thrown together, bits and pieces from the leftover scraps by a 3:00am drunk-off-her-ass God, who just needed to meet the numbers for the quarter review. He didn’t encapsulate evil or anything - he just didn’t have to do with anything at all. He existed because he did, as he did, with nothing more or less or… well, anything. He just was.

He moves through life unchanged, unaltered. He is the constant, the monotony, the non-living of living that is sleep.

Maybe that’s why he was always tired.

If Amy told him to jump, he would do it. Without hesitation. She was life itself, her smile was the heartbeat of the universe.

If she told him not to jump… well, that would be an awkward conversation, to be sure. He wouldn’t know why he ended up on the top of the precinct’s roof, for one thing, or how she’d be staring at him with tears in her eyes.

Amy was the stars in the sky, stunningly beautiful and loving and how Jake tried to see them now… but it was all swallowed up under the smog of the city, pushing down and choking him. A physical weight on his shoulders, pushing him down towards the pavement infinity.

Infinity seemed less scary when he could picture it all being comprised of Amy. But, of course, infinity wasn’t like that.

He didn’t think.

Certainly wasn’t certain enough to risk it.

Not if it meant there would be no Amy.

A world without Amy? Existence without her?

But she was the world. She was existence itself. She was life, she was the sun and moon and earth and sky and the air in his lungs and the taste of coffee and the feeling of being loved.

That was Amy.

Jake loves her.

He loves her like a man drowning loves air, like a father loves alcohol, like a perp loves shooting cops who are just trying to do their job. He loves her.

Loved.

She loves him.

Loved.

No.

Loves.

Because Amy is everything, and everything is Amy.

The breeze that brushes against his clothes is soft, there is no sun and the moon is being clouded away by the heavy city smoke, 

She did everything right.

She always did.

She never went too close to the line.

Jake was the one always dancing on the precipice.

But here they were.

It didn’t matter that Amy had done everything right.

It didn’t matter that Jake did everything wrong.

They had found each other, latching onto one another. Begging to love, to be loved. Jake had fallen in love with the universe, with life itself, and Amy had fallen in love with him, too.

“Jake, come down.”

Her voice was ethereal, and when she said his name he could have cried. Except he was already crying.

Amy spoke his name like it was sacred, like it was special. When she said his name, he felt like he was maybe, just maybe, absolved. He achieved redemption from all in the way her voice canted and the way her skin felt on his.

Jake blinked, for just a moment, and the entire universe vanished and he was nowhere and nothing, in an abyss and there was no Amy and that was unacceptable. But then he finished blinking and everything was back, and Amy was still standing in front of him, present here but also here in every single molecule and speck of life.

He had toed the line too far again.

He had made Amy hurt.

He had enticed her to step closer to the line, to let down her guard and exist with him, mortal and flawed as he was.

He had asked the universe to stop for a chat, for a bet, for a game, for a date, for a night, for a lifetime.

And she had.

But now she was asking him to stop. To slow down, to step back. To breathe.

It always feels easier to breathe when Amy was there.

Amy.

The universe was made of her, but there was only one of her. She was everything and yet she was standing in front of him, vulnerable and open and pleading. With her eyes full of tears and her hands shaking.

Jake was making the universe cry.

It broke his heart to see how he had brought her down.

He had asked the universe to stop and stay for him, exist with him, and she had. She asked him to exist with her, and he couldn’t do it. He was failing.

So imperfectly was he made.

A hand touched his. An anchor from the void offered by the universe. Freely given.

Jake could feel the starlight warmth shining under her skin.

Amy smiled, sad and soft, and Jake knew that that was the face of utter devastation. The universe had seen him fail, but it was too late. He had lured her in with jokes and games, offered her a place to rest, and she never had a chance. She had accepted. She had said yes. She had married him. The universe had married him.

She had no chance, now. He had been tied to her since the moment he came alive, but she had chosen to tie herself to him.

Now they were both on the razor edge of the line.

The universe spoke to him, in her soft voice that was so kind and so beautiful and so absolutely _heartbroken_.

He felt his own heart tear and twist at the sound of that devastation that he had wrought her.

How much more he would bring her.

Jake wasn’t sure the universe would ever stop crying if he went too far across the line.

He drew back from the line.

Back, towards the universe which waited behind him, all soft and warm and full of light. Her arms wrapped around him, and he felt the weight of the sky lift off his back. Amy tucked her face into his chest, shoulders shaking, and he felt the entire world tremble around him as she did. His hands rose to touch, to hug her, wishing that the universe would simply absorb him into her so that he didn’t have to keep existing without her.

He had made the universe cry.

He had made the universe approach the line.

The universe had made him step back from it.

And Jake held Amy tight.

**Author's Note:**

> i know it's not my usual thing, but this was in my head today and i felt compelled to write it.


End file.
